Haptic Floor

A Technology Fostering Art and Innovation

The Haptic Floor is a hardware solution created by the Society for Arts and Technology [SAT]. Designed for creators, museums, cultural institutions, and producers, this interactive floor enables an immersive and multisensory experience, combining haptics and multimedia. This innovation transforms the way we interact with digital environments by adding a physical dimension to mixed and augmented reality.

The Problem

Current immersive experiences are often limited to vision and hearing, neglecting the sense of touch and haptic feeling. This lack of physical interaction reduces the engagement and impact of digital environments on users.

Our Solution

The Haptic Floor fills this gap by integrating interactive surfaces capable of reproducing haptic/physical sensations. Thanks to this technology, users can feel movement, texture, and vibration, fostering total immersion and a more engaging interaction with digital content.

Why Choose the Haptic Floor?

• Innovative – A unique technology combining haptics and multimedia.
• Accessible – Easy to integrate into various environments (museums, stages, immersive rooms).
• Customizable – Adaptable to the needs of creators as well as industry.
• Unique Experience – Redefines sensory and immersive interactions.
• Safe – A robust, waterproof design with easy maintenance and setup.

How Does It Work?

• Technology: A modular floor composed of triangular tiles, each point of resting on either a fixed vertex or an actuator with a possible vertical travel of 2 cm. Our Mmesh control tool, based on a Linux system optimized for real-time and on D-BOX technologies, allows the control of an arbitrary number of haptic actuators via a standard Ethernet network. The Telluriq cross-platform user interface displays the state of the actuators in real-time and enables the simple configuration of the system.
• Compatibility: The system is compatible with the most common intermedia software; it only requires the transmission of OSC messages to control its actuators. It is therefore compatible with all types of XR, VR, AR, and interactive installations. It integrates instantly with tools such as Max/MSP, PureData, TouchDesigner, ossia score, Usine, Processing, Arduino, etc.
• This unique device—whose design and prototyping were funded by the Government of Quebec—is the result of a collaboration between the Society for Arts and Technology [SAT] and the Ministère de l’Économie, de l’Innovation et de l’Énergie du Québec.
• Our manufacturing partners are CTA, D-BOX, and Show Canada.